[bvw]

It was always a popular delusion that there was an unbiased "free press", and a recent delusion it was as well. At our founding folks knew the various presses for the political line they took and the candidates and later the parties they supported.

Moreover the popular fascination with politics, and the political press are both, as I recollect, American innovations.

It's not for nothing that First Amendment, as is the rest of that Bill of Rights. The Founders and the public then at the founding wanted to protect certain distinctly American innovations in civil society.

Not particular presses, nor religions, but to ensure access by all citizens to the press, to religions and religious practices, to all the arms of a military and navy, to jury trials, etc. A level of un-infringed liberty in access to all of those, founded on a special brotherhood of trust in fellow Americans -- that was the uniqueness.

But that NEVER meant a "free press" in the sense you lament. The press all always been highly biased, and always forms alliances with power.

[RKV]

Yep.